


This Is Halloween...

by Whreflections



Category: Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Established Relationship, Fluff, Halloween, M/M, Pre-Canon, Pumpkins
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-04
Updated: 2012-11-04
Packaged: 2017-11-17 23:06:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,799
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/554194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Whreflections/pseuds/Whreflections
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Just a glimpse of family bonding pre-ZA, in a 'verse where Rick and Shane are raising Carl together.  Carl's five, and the boys promised him he could pick out the design for the pumpkin...even if Shane doesn't think it fits the holiday.  Halloween's supposed to be scary, but Carl, he just wants a tiger.</p>
            </blockquote>





	This Is Halloween...

**Author's Note:**

> This is utter fluff, I warn you. UTTER FLUFF. I feel this pairing needs more of that, however, so that's totally not an apology, XD

“No, dad, _not_ scary; I want a tiger!” 

Carl’s fingers tugged incessantly at Shane’s belt, never quite sure he had Shane’s attention if he wasn’t lookin’.  He was like Rick that way; he wanted you to _look_ at him when you talked.  Chuckling, Shane hooked his arms around Carl’s shoulders to hug Carl in tight against his side. 

“C’mon, bud, it’s Halloween!  Look, we can find all kinds of stuff here, what about a ghost, huh?  Or a skull, that’d be cool, yeah?  Like a pirate, like-“

“Daaaaad!”  At five years old, there was nothin’ like the way the kid could plead.  He gave up on the belt in favor of latching his arms around Shane’s waist itself, chin digging into his side as he looked up at him.  “You said I got to pick the pumpkin; you promised!” 

“Alright, alright, that I did; you got me there.  So…”  Mock frustrated, Shane closed out of the computer window a little more forcefully than necessary.  Before he even looked down at him, he could feel Carl’s sigh.  “A tiger, huh?” 

“Daddy printed it last night.  He said-“

“He’d have put it in the kitchen with the newspaper; he’d know I’d cave.  Alright little man-“  He leaned over, pressed his lips against Carl’s hair just before ruffling it up.  Carl smacked at the errant strands, old enough to laugh and pull away but not yet big enough that he really minded.  “Let’s go carve this pumpkin, get it ready ‘fore daddy gets back, alright?” 

Carl beat him down the stairs and through the foyer to the kitchen, taking the path at a run Shane’s momma would’ve corrected but he never did.  Kids’d be kids, he figured, and that wasn’t always a bad thing.  Five was a good age, still so small but finally big enough that he was carryin’ on full conversation, making up games and picking baseball positions and when he looked up at Shane from under his covers before bedtime lately, he looked like such a little _person_ Shane could hardly catch his breath.  He’d be growin’ up soon enough, but these years were good ones, and he and Rick had both agreed Carl should enjoy them as much as possible.  Rick’s dad had been absent even when he’d been home and Shane’s had meant the world to him until he died too early, differing weights that pulled them both in the same direction.  They weren’t gonna be absent fathers, that was for damn sure.  Even both working at the station like they did, they’d been determined to make it work an so far, Carl’s kindergarten teacher seemed to agree that they were. 

Carl was a bright kid, happy and well adjusted, and his excitement was infectious.  With his palms pressed flat against the pumpkin they’d picked out and gutted the night before, he looked back at Shane with dancing eyes. 

“What do we do first?” 

Shane jerked his head toward the corner with the telephone, the drawer just underneath it. “Grab us some tape.” 

The stencil was just where he’d thought it’d be, on top of the newspaper on the corner of the table, ready and waiting.  Whatever else he might could accuse him of dependin’ on the day, he could never say Rick didn’t know him like the back of his hand.  It only made sense, really, only a natural progression since they’d been together ever since freshman year.  They’d both made a failed first attempt at the football team, both walked home in the cold with their shoulders hunched, trying to lift each other’s spirits by talkin’ about all the guys that made it that weren’t quite as good, how they’d both had off days at tryouts, how they’d make it next year.   They’d ended up in the woods kicking leaves and rambling, and when Rick tripped on a root and brought them both down to the ground, Shane had followed through on the crazy idea to kiss that laughter right off his mouth. 

Too many years later to feel good about countin’ now that he was startin’ to feel old, he was still shutting Rick up the same way.  That was important with the two of them, honestly, because on the surface they might not always appear to fit, but they never stopped tryin’.  Shane wasn’t afraid to fight with him, hadn’t even been scared really the night they’d they’d punched the shit out of each other and Rick had drove off in Shane’s truck.  This thing between the two of them, it ran too deep, was too solid to give.  Just like he’d known he would, fifteen minutes later Rick came drivin’ back, found Shane sittin’ on the side of the road and crouched down next to him.  Right there in the ditch Rick had cleaned his cuts out with Jack Daniel’s poured onto the sleeve of one of his oldest plaid shirts, had turned his head to murmur an apology and kiss Shane’s neck when the alcohol burned in the cut he’d made. 

After that night, wild and nineteen, they’d never actually drawn blood from each other again.  Not to say it’d never happen again for sure; it could.  So far though, it had never needed to.  That one spectacular night had proved what a bunch of smaller fights had pretty much already told them- neither of them was about to leave, not when it was all too worth fighting for. 

The past few years there was Carl, too, and well, Shane never would’ve thought as a kid he’d ever be this lucky. 

At the table, Shane taped the pattern to the pumpkin, corners cut to wrap it against the curve.  Carl kept sidestepping around his chair, impatient, and when Shane finally sat down to start carving, he patted his leg.

“Alright, buddy, c’mon.  Come gimme a hand.” 

Carl was in his lap quicker than he could blink, all squirmy and unbalanced.  They were teachin’ him to respect weapons early, how he should never touch a gun or a knife cause when he was big enough, they’d show him how to do it right.  He’d learned well so far, didn’t even try to touch the knife in Shane’s hand until Shane nodded, let Carl’s fingers curl once around hilt next to his.  The cut was a simple one and he controlled the motion, kept his arm as the driving force and let Carl’s little fingers squeeze ineffectively against his.  When the piece slid free Carl cheered, twisted on his lap to rush out “Dad, dad look, I did it!”, and he smiled and clapped his boy on the shoulder, light.

“You sure did, look at that!  Tell you what, you’re gettin’ strong, man.  Can’t believe how big you’re gettin’ these days.” 

After that, though, he gently eased Carl’s hand back, told him he could help by watchin’ the pattern if he promised to keep his fingers back, and Shane got to work in earnest.  It was pretty slow going, slow on the stripes and slower because Carl was always in the way.  If he wasn’t shiftin’ on Shane’s lap he was turning his head, blocking the view or demanding attention with his “Dad, hey, dad did I tell you that-“

There were few things he’d have rather come home early to do. 

By the time Rick got home they were almost finished, Shane’s arm nearly elbow deep inside the pumpkin as he scraped off slivers he’d told Carl they could tack with toothpicks to the outside of the pumpkin, perfect feathery whiskers for non-menacing tiger cheeks.  Carl scrambled up to meet him just as he came in the door, hooked a quick hug around his waist as he rambled about the pumpkin before dashing upstairs to try and find the camera Shane had told him would be on the dresser in their room, the one he could only just reach. 

Just maybe, he could get it down the stairs and manage to keep it in his hands. 

Rick settled his hat onto the counter, dragged a hand through his hair to muss up the places where it had flattened. 

“That’s lookin’ like a pretty good tiger.”

“Ah, she’s alright, I told Carl she should’ve been snarling, something to make her look more like-“

Rick’s hands framed his face, pulled Shane to him for a kiss that cut his ramble short.  He tasted like coffee, like the cigarettes he so often insisted he no longer smoked.  It didn’t matter, not to him; Shane had always loved the taste.  Instinctive, Shane moved to pull his arm up out of the pumpkin, seeking to cup Rick’s cheek and feel the slight brush of his five o’clock shadow under the pad of his thumb. 

Rick’s thumb digging into the inside of his elbow stopped him short, kept him pinned in place. 

“You get that slimy shit on me, I _will_ kill you.” 

“Oh I see how it is, you’ve had blood all over you, gasoline, every damn thing under the sun but no this, _this_ is gross?” 

“Damn straight.”  Rick smiled, punctuated his answers with a nip at Shane’s lip.  Long as there weren’t punches involved, Rick definitely wasn’t averse to drawin’ just a little blood from him. 

“Man, I don’t even know you sometimes.”

“Mm, I bet you don’t.”  Another kiss and he was just startin’ to think about pulling his hand out and going for the sink, startin’ to think about the warmth of Rick’s palms against his jawline, how every time Rick ever came back to him from any kind of separation that was how he greeted him.  The way Rick kissed it all came through so well, all the love and devotion he didn’t always speak. 

At the clunk of Carl’s shoes on the stairs they broke apart, not far but just enough to breathe, enough to be ready to focus when Carl burst into the kitchen. 

“Daddy, I couldn’t find it; don’t think it’s there, but dad said we need toothpicks too and-“

Rick scooped Carl up, talking to him softly as he headed over to the counter to let him kneel on it, let him look through the cabinet for himself for the multi colored toothpicks they’d had the same box of for God only knew how many years.  At the table Shane kept scraping, carving out whiskers and watching his fingers and listening to his boys behind him, the easy sounds of family. 

Over the years it might’ve become expected, and hell, one day he might even properly get used to it, to the fact that he was theirs and they were his and this thing was actually gonna last.  Even then, he knew enough about himself to know that it’d never cease to keep him wantin’ more of it. 


End file.
